"Human Pressure meets Climate Change: The Extinction Vortex of the Freshwater Pearl Mussel Margaritifera margaritifera How does the Evolutionary History Relate to the Current Status as Endangered Species?"

The Freshwater Pearl Mussels M. margaritifera is an endangered Holartic species in the family of Margaritiferadae in the order of Unionoidea and Class of Bivalvia.M. margaritifera is found in North America, Europe and through into Siberia.It has been declining throughout the European part with a negative forecast on survivability of the species [1] IUCN 1 .The longevity of M. margaritifera and the fragility of the reproduction conditions as well as habitat selectivity regarding environmental requirements pose difficult niche conditions for the species.Population decline is not only related to species-specific intrinsic characteristics and extrinsic factor like water pollution (IUCN 2 ), but also caused by the introduction of invasive species such as the less specialised, non-threatened Freshwater Zebra Mussel Dreissena polymorpha (Araujo, 2006).We discuss the vulnerability of the species in the light of the conceptual framework of Modern Synthesis, MS and the Extended Evolutionary Synthesis, EES [2].In the outlook we review the conservation status and briefly evaluate the opportunities of EES driven approaches for further research on reestablishment of the species [3].